HOW TO MAKE A DIY  WALL HANGING

I love statement art but sometimes it can be expensive! After buying a house two years ago, and then trying to furnish the whole thing, I know how expensive it can be. A few years back I owned a weaving shop and loved exploring fiber arts. I came up with the idea for this wall hanging/tapestry of sorts when looking at a lot of the random craft supplies I had around. Making the most of quarantine and trying to use what I have ya know? Pulling inspiration from a few of my favorite artists I pulled together materials that felt organic and natural. I wanted something modern and warm. This DIY wall hanging is inexpensive to make, pretty easy to complete, and will elevate any space! Ready to jump in? Here are the supplies and a step by step to complete the project. I also have an instagram highlight that walks through the process if you are more of a visual learner.

Find that link here – DIY Tapestry Instagram Story Highlight.

DIY WALL HANGING SUPPLIES:

A lot of these can be picked up from your local craft store, but I have linked everything on Amazon if you would like to order online. Contains affiliate links. Thanks for supporting me continuing to make DIY tutorials.

Canvas drop cloth
Black wire
Rope – Natural Color, 5/8
Rope – Natural Color, 1/2
Circle leather pieced
Brown Rope – I got mine from Hobby Lobby but I can’t find it online. Here is something similar.
Leather Pieces for ends – They only have black online, which could be cool! Here are some other leather pieces on Amazon that could work.
Wooden dowel – I got mine from Home Depot and they were able to cut it to size for me as well
Yarn – Any color you want to incorporate will work
Needle
Thread
Hot glue gun & glue
Sewing machine (Optional)

“Read more” for instructions!

DIY WALL HANGING Instructions:

The TLDR version of the DIY is, make your canvas and hot glue rope on in whatever design you want. If you want some more specifics, continue on through the next steps. It is really that simple.

Step 1:
Pick the size you want you canvas to be. I bought my wooden dowel from Home Depot where they will cut it to size for free. Mine was 5 ft long and I then taped out the size I wanted on the wall and ended up going with the dimensions 25 inches long by 50 inches wide. You wall hanging should be smaller than the length of your wooden dowel. You want enough wood to stick out the end on each side so that you can cover it with your leather piece for a polished look.

Step 2:
Sew the canvas drop cloth to the dimensions you have decided on. If you order the canvas from Amazon that I recommended, you will need to cut it down to size. I cut my canvas to roughly the size I wanted leaving 4 inches extra at the top for sewing the wooden dowel pocket and 1 extra inch seam allowance around the canvas for my hem. I then did a double fold hem on both sides and the bottom. You don’t need to hem the top. If you don’t want to sew,  you can do this step with with hot glue. I would just be super careful about the amount of glue used so it doesn’t bleed through the fabric on the front. You could also order a smaller drop cloth with a finished edge and make that work.  Below is a quick template that outlines the dimensions that I made my wall hanging to. The white spaces on the canvas indicate a folded line.

Step 3:
Sew the pocket for the wooden dowel. This is why you added four extra inches to the top of your fabric. Fold over the extra top two inches and sew a straight line across the top. If you ware using hot glue, turn you canvas over, make one long line with glue and fold over the top creating a pocket.

Step 4:
Iron your tapestry and lay it on a flat surface. If you use hot glue to make your dowel pocket, be careful ironing around this part. Now for the fun part. Explore placement of your rope and leather pieces. This can be a free flowing process. I just placed things and moved them around until it felt right to me. There is no wrong way to do this part!

Step 5:
Once you have landed on the placement you will need to cut the rope pieces to size. Make sure after you cut a piece of rope that you tape the ends. If you choose not to tape the ends of your rope you might notice that they will start to unravel. In the next couple of steps you will tie off the ends of your ropes to avoid this, but tape in the interim helped me.

Step 6:
Depending on your design you might not need to do this part. My design had two elements that required me stitching them together so that they would hold their shape. For the circle element I did a simple top stitch so that I could glue it down as one piece instead of gluing each line of the circle. This seemed easier to me in the long run but required more upfront work.

Step 7:
After you have the piece of the design that require stitching complete you will need to design how to finished off your piece of rope. I did this two different ways on my white yarn, I use yarn and wrapped it around the ends of the rope. For my brown yarn, I finished the ends with wire. To start I placed the wire on the underside of the rope and then wrapped it around three times then cutting with wire cutters.

Step 8:
You have made it so far! Now you get to start attaching stuff with the Hot Glue. The most important part for this step is that your tapestry base is completely flat with no wrinkles. If you place your shapes while the tapestry is wrinkly, the shapes will pull weird at your fabric and give you unsightly lines. Hot glue rope and leather pieces to your canvas. I started with very small dots of glue to get the shape right and then went in and filled in more of the spaces. Be super careful with the amount of glue you use, you don’t want the hot glue to show.

Step 9:
Cut the square leather strips to size and attach to each end of the wooden dowel with hot glue. I made the seam on the back so when it was hanging on the wall you couldn’t see it.

Step 10:
Thread the wooden dowel through the pocket.

Step 11:
Hang on the wall! I hammered two nails into the studs and then balance the tapestry dowel on both of the nails. The canvas weave isn’t very tight so the nails slip right through.

Voila! Hopefully that helps and now you can make your very own DIY Wall Hanging. Please feel free to reach out with any questions you might have. Please share on Pinterest if you liked the tutorial.